Brunneofusispora sinensis

Brunneofusispora sinensis S.K. Huang & K.D. Hyde, in Phookamsak et al., Fungal Diversity 95: 38 (2019)

Index Fungorum number: IF555600; Facesoffungi number: FoF04863

Saprobic on dead wood. Sexual morph Ascomata 325–370 μm diam., perithecial, solitary to scattered, immersed, eventually erumpent, globose to subglobose, uni-loculate, glabrous, dark brown to black, ostiole, papillate with long beak. Ostioles central, lined with periphyses. Peridium 20–45 μm wide, equally thick-walled, composed of 5–8 strata, of blackened pseudoparenchymatous cells, arranged in a textura angularis. Hamathecium composed of numerous, 1.5–3.5 μm wide, filamentous, septate pseudoparaphyses, embedded in a gelatinous matrix. Asci 53–110 × 9–18 μm (  = 75 × 14 μm, n = 30), 8-spored, bitunicate, fissitunicate, cylindric-clavate to clavate, short pedicellate, rounded at the apex, with an ocular chamber. Ascospores 18–22 × 5–8.5 μm ( = 20 × 7 μm, n = 50), overlapping 2-seriate, initially hyaline, becoming light brown to brown at maturity, broadly fusiform, 1-septate, constricted at the septum, smooth-walled, with guttules, surrounded by mucilaginous sheath. Asexual morph Undetermined.

Culture characteristics: Ascospores germinated on PDA within 2 weeks at 23 °C, colony on PDA reaching 1 cm diam. after 4 weeks, irregular in shape, surface rough, with edge umbonate and well-defined margin, velvety to floccose; from above brown; from below cream, not producing pigmentation on agar medium.

Material examined: CHINA, Yunnan Province, Songming, Niulan river, on dead wood, 1 October 2016, S.K. Huang (KUN-HKAS 97451, holotype), ex-type living culture, KUMCC 17-0030.

GenBank numbers: ITS = MH393558, LSU = MH393557, SSU = MH393556, TEF1-α = MH395329.

Notes: Multigene phylogenetic analyses reveal that our new taxon forms a distinct lineage, but clusters with three isolates of Massarina rubi (Fuckel) Sacc. (current name: Lophiotrema rubi (Fuckel) Y. Zhang ter et al.) in Occultibambusaceae . We introduce a new genus Brunneofusispora to accommodate B. sinensis, which was collected from a woody plant in Yunnan, China. Brunneofusispora resembles Neooccultibambusa in occurring on woody plants and forming globose to subglobose ascomata, but Brunneofusispora differs from Neooccultibambusa in having a long prominent neck (Doilom et al. 2017). Brunneofusispora resembles Lophiotrema in having cylindrical, cylindric-clavate asci and fusiform ascospores, but it differs from Lophiotrema in having globose to subglobose ascomata, with a long prominent neck. Lophiotrema species have minute papilla, with crest-like or slit-like openings (Zhang et al. 2009b; Hashimoto et al. 2017).

Figure 1. Maximum likelihood phylogenetic tree generated from analysis of a combined LSU, SSU, ITS, RPB2 and TEF1-α sequence dataset for 77 taxa of representative families in Pleosporales. Melanomma pulvispyrius (CBS 124080) was selected as the outgroup taxon. ML and MP support values greater than 60% and Bayesian posterior probabilities greater than 0.90 BYPP are indicated above the nodes as ML/PP/MP. The strain numbers are noted before the species names. Isolates from this study are indicated in blue. Ex-type strains are indicated in bold.